Sea of Love…

I believe that our experience of God is like an endless Sea of Love and, in that sea of love, God will send us perfect storms in an effort to perfect us to his own design. I believe his common design for all of us is that we think, speak, live, love and act from a place of compassionate truth. But, within that Grand Design, I believe there´s also a personal and unique design inscribed within each of our hearts.

I think the more we try to shape ourselves to a given model of authenticity, normality, conformity, goodness or perfection, the less we give ourselves the opportunity to gaze upon and contemplate the singular blueprint of our own unique design. And the more we try to limit, constrict or fit ourselves into stereotypes that others offer to us, with their expectations and their judgements of criticism or praise, the less we allow the will of God to work through us in a way that feels sacred and true to that unique, divine inscription we hold within.

To me, our unique design is one that gradually reveals itself to us throughout the course of our lives, through the situations we experience, the feelings they stir within us and the level of courage we display in accepting the truth of the messages that they bring to the surface from the deep. Messages about the truth of God´s love and how it manifests itself here on earth.

For the Sea of God´s Love encompasses everything: love for ourselves, love for others, romantic and erotic love, spiritual and divine love, maternal and paternal love, filial love, love of creation and expression, love of passion, love of nature, love of community, love of peace. It is not a constant and static entity. It is continually moving, continually shifting, continually growing and expanding and it gives and takes its different shapes and forms in its invitation to us to understand, trust, accept and willingly enter its life-giving ebb and flow.

“Love rests on no foundation. It is an endless ocean, with no beginning or end.“

– Rumi

Sometimes the storms God sends to us will physically break apart the vessel of security that we were given, fashioned for ourselves or chose to board; a significant relationship; a state of health; a much-loved job or profession; a family; a community; a place we thought was home. And sometimes the storm will wreck the internal image we were carrying of ourselves, and the external identity that came with it; the one which gave us status, confidence, a feeling of security about the future and a sense of calm within our lives.

These internal storms are the most challenging to weather, I believe, because they call into question everything we thought about ourselves and leave us feeling adrift in a sea of emotions that threaten to sink us and everything we took for granted about the world in which we live and who we are within it. They can leave us feeling ship-wrecked, exhausted, half-drowned in confusion, anger, frustration and despair. But, I believe, these painful and challenging moments are the ones that truly form us and offer us the opportunity to become the ´all´ that we were designed to be.

There is truth in the age-old saying that “God never sends us anything that we´re not strong enough to bear.” We only have to look around us at the countless number of those who´ve experienced, been humbled by, learned from and grown stronger from seemingly catastrophic events in their lives. These are the people that we admire, are inspired by and learn from; the ones who energise us and show us the healing power of hope and meaning in this human life.

People like Viktor Frankl (Neurologist, Psychiatrist, Philosopher, Auschwitz survivor and author of Man’s Search for Meaning) who, despite losing his wife, parents and brother in Nazi concentration camps, found enough resilience to support and encourage fellow camp inmates during his incaceration and embarked on a series of lectures shortly after his liberation, collectively published as ‘Yes to Life – Inspite of Everything’. Frankl has become a beacon and champion of hope against all odds, for thousands of people who have read his work and who have been inspired by his spirit and belief in the power of the search for meaning and in the sustaining force of fraternal love.

Human beings like Viktor Frankl take what their devastating experiences teach them (after allowing themselves time, with love, to grieve for what they lost) as an invitation and gift to seek more in their lives, and to share what they learned from their experiences with others. They don´t allow themselves to become embittered, they find enough love for themselves to continue learning and growing and, in doing so, they create for themselves continuous lives of meaning, which then shine the light of love, hope and possibility as a beacon for us all.

It´s only lack of faith in ourselves, lack of true love for ourselves, and lack of trust in the mysterious and endlessly-challenging ways of God that stop us from discovering and living this self-same truth.

You are the deep innerness of all things,
the last word that can never be spoken.
To each of us you reveal yourself differently:
to the ship as coastline, to the shore as a ship.

Rainer Maria Rilke 
(The Book of Pilgrimage)